Claiming to be wise, they have become fools

Word from the Center
Written By Peter Scaer

Why is it that when we seem to have everything, we so readily throw it all away? Maybe it's not about things after all. My 50-inch screen hardly seems big enough.

I have quite a lot, so why does it pain me to know others have more? So it is; we live in a spiritually impoverished age, untethered from reality, untethered from things primary, like family, church, and God.

Biden's Catholicism has gotten some good press, to be sure. But let's not kid ourselves. It's popular in a secular age, because it is little more than an ornament, or perhaps a lap dog. . . .

And yet we have folks who should know better gushing over his civility, never mind his full-throated support for abortion, using our money to end the lives of children at home and abroad. Oh, that we could actually have a conversation about the transgender tragedy without Facebook and Twitter placing us in their jails. Did you know that some 90 percent of transgender kids, if simply allowed to grow up, will grow out of it? Will grow comfortable in their own bodies? (Isn't that what the Ashley Graham phenomenon is all about?)

It's breathtaking how quickly we are retreating from reality. I remember when the Indiana legislators ran away from declaring that marriage was one man and one woman, and then were overwhelmed with RFRA. So, it's not just the Left coasts. It's a question of whether we have the nerve, right in the middle of the heartland, to speak the truth for the sake of others. Or whether we want to coast into oblivion.

We have good things to say. We have ultrasounds to show. We have the equality of all persons. We have the joy of boyhood and girlhood, moms and dads, and real marriage, which begins to knit a web of relationships that include grandmas and grandpas, aunts and uncles, and cousins. We have biology and sociology and medicine. And, yes, we have the Lord. Or better yet, we shall cling to the Lord's words, because speaking the truth takes a bit of courage in our cancel culture. But we can hang together or hang separately, but even so, we are never alone. And if we seek to please the Lord, we will in fact help our neighbor, the littlest among us, waiting to be born; the confused child, who needs just a little love and patience, a little guidance.

So it is, we are surrounded by fools claiming to be wise. So quickly do they parrot the new and ever-changing truths. Knowing that, let's not make it a habit of seeking their approval. We've got better things to say, and we should say them.

The Rev. Dr. Peter Scaer is chairman and professor of Exegetical Theology and director of the M.A. program at Concordia Theological Seminary, Fort Wayne, Ind.

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See photographs from the Chicago March for Life drive-in rally at Concordia Theological Seminary in Fort Wayne, Indiana.

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Dr. Ryan Anderson explains in a recent Issues, Etc. podcast why Amazon removed his book “When Harry Became Sally.” Click here to listen.

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“Christ does not refuse our sense of tragedy or awareness of pain. He bears it in love, affirming our condition, carrying our sorrows to the end, all the way to the heart of God.”
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